


Here to Stay

by liamozes



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Anxiety, Beauxbatons, First Dates, Light Angst, M/M, Mahoutokoro, Original Character Death(s), Vicchan Is Alive, Wizards, oblivious yuuri - Freeform, set in jkr's world, wizarding homophobia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-26
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2018-09-19 20:56:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9460139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liamozes/pseuds/liamozes
Summary: Katsuki Yuuri has used up all his luck after an tragedy with a student and finds himself being politely kicked out of Mahoutokoro and referred to Beauxbatons.Viktor Nikiforov has just won his fifth muggle GPF title and he has disappeared from public eye, only to reappear at his coach's ex-wife's school a year later to teach.Featuring Yuri as an angry fae student, Phichit as the supportive magical mirror, and others in this Professor!AU.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I just love the idea of Yuuri and Viktor as professors at a magical school (set in JKR's universe). There will be some figure skating in the later chapters, and there are also some personal headcanons about magic overall (like the fact that Yuuri is 22 and started teaching before that). Yuuri still does ballet, but he won't skate for a while.

They tell him that it wasn’t his fault.

But they don’t exactly tell him it was an accident either, so Yuuri is inclined to believe that it was his fault, no matter what they say.

It doesn’t help that everywhere he goes there are whispers that follow him. Heavy stares from his students trail him as he walks along the corridors. His colleagues barely speak to him afterwards, keeping to themselves. There are letters too, full of hateful words and threats, Yuuri doesn't open them and throws them into the nearby sea.

Yuuri waits for the day the headmistress sends him a paper bird, requesting him to visit her office. The small crane flutters into his classroom after the grade seven students leave his class speedily, averting their gazes from his, almost bashfully.

He knew better though, they also blamed him. The crane unfolds itself and he scans the message on it. Yuuri sighs at the content, and a cigarette burn spreads from the centre of the paper, until all that was left of the message was ashes.

“Minako-sensei. You wanted to see me?” Yuuri says as he enters the office.

“Yuuri.” Immediately he knew this was bad, the headmistress almost never called him by his first name. She mostly used his last name or that nickname he couldn't shake off from his school days. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

He hastily sits and a chair materializes beneath him. Minako preferred Western decor, the enormous cherrywood desk and intimidating trophy cases on either side of her small sitting room. The one thing that stood out was the large painting of a blooming sakura, the petals falling at regular intervals. That had been there since Yuuri was a student and was probably as old as the school itself.

“You might have to brace yourself.” Minako conjures up a box of tissues along with a steaming cup of chai, and hands it to him. She knew all about Yuuri’s anxiety, he returns this surprisingly thoughtful gesture with a shy smile.

“You know what I’m talking about, don’t you, Yuuri?” She says, clasping her hands together. “I’m not going to waste time talking to you about it.”

Yuuri nods, an unsaid  _thank you._

“The board has been under some pressure from the parents, even after issuing a statement, to deal with you.”

He sips his tea, ignoring the scalding hot liquid as it warms him up from the inside.

“I have asked them to allow you to teach, you have always had such a bond with our students after all, it would be a shame to let you leave. They refused.”

Minako pauses, inhaling deeply before going on.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to terminate your contract with Mahoutokoro.”

Yuuri stares. He had seen this coming, but it was one thing to worry about it and another thing to experience it.

“Yuuri.” The headmistress’ voice is gentle. “You’re crying.”

He lifts a hand to touch his face, they came away wet. He wipes them away but they kept on coming.

Minako whistles. “Damn, I didn’t know you had witch water.”

“Sorry.” He hiccups, the tears were swelling until they fell to the ground, each the size of a pearl, leaving dark stains on the floor.

“Your magic did always follow your emotions.” Minako smiles sadly. “Breathe, Yuuri.”

Yuuri takes a few deep breathes, remembering his breathing excercises. He curls his hands into fists and will the tears to stop.

“Are we calm?”

Yuuri dips his head firmly. “Ye-Yes.”

Minako allows him a few more moments to compose himself before continuing on with the termination.

“Hand please.” Minako grasps his offered hand and holds his contract with her other. She deftly makes a small cut from the tip of his index finger, Yuuri barely feels any pain. The blood drips onto the waxy paper of his contract and he watches impassively as the words on it dissolve.

The blank paper vanishes and pouch appears in his released hand. Minako speaks softly, as though trying not to startle Yuuri. “Your payment for three months. You’ll have to leave the school by next monday, the vice is already looking for a substitute.”

He puts it away in the sleeve of his robes wordlessly. His finger was tingling, like something had been drawn from it.

“Alright,” Minako claps her hands and a single envelope pops up on her desk. It literally popped up with a loud noise, making Yuuri flinch. “Sorry about that. I may have been asked to terminate your contract, but it doesn’t mean I’m not going to offer you references.”

“Thank you.” Yuuri says gratefully.

“This is a letter from the headmistress of Beauxbatons, not the old one, Madame Maxime, but the new one from Russia, Lilia Baranovskaya.”

“The former prima ballerina of the Bolshoi Ballet?” Yuuri had heard of the famous ballerina, being a ballet dancer himself, and wondered why hadn’t he heard about Madame Baranovskaya’s new job.

“Who else?” Minako’s voice is now filled with admiration and awe. “She remembered me from my touring days, not a lot of people know she’s the headmistress yet. It’s still news in Europe.”

“She left her job as instructor?”

“I suppose.” Minako shrugs, indicating she was just as clueless as Yuuri. “Anyway, there's a job as open at Beauxbatons and you have to take it!”

The brunette is standing now, waving a fist in Yuuri’s face.

“I-I-” Yuuri stammers, go to an entirely different country? He had some fluency in French but he wasn’t good enough to speak it in front of others. What if he applied and they didn’t take him in?

“You’re looking a bit pale, glasses boy.” Minako’s face is tinged with concern.

“I’m fine.” Yuuri says quickly, with a slight cough.

“I’ve told Lilia that you have experience in charms, you did have gold robes when you were here so it wouldn’t be a problem switching fields right?” Minako is speaking rapidly, Yuuri focuses on her voice. “She said she’ll think about it, that probably means you’ll be able to get it.”

“Beauxbatons?”

“They want you, Yuuri.” Minako leans over her desk, looking deeply into his eyes. “You sure as hell have the qualifications for the job, kid. Pack your bags, brush up your French, and prepare your lesson plans. You’ll get a message later from Lilia soon."

He doesn’t voice his worries, instead he rises and bows, forcing some cheerfulness into his voice. “Thank you, Minako-sensei!”

“You better not tell anyone I helped you, Katsuki, I’m not about to put my neck on the line for someone who still can’t dance in front of an audience.”

Minako shows him to the entrance hall, where papers were being folded into cranes and sent all over Japan. She didn’t use a secretary, even though the board had always recommended candidates for her. The headmistress slaps him on the back, knocking the wind out of him.

He was nearly out of the room when he heard Minako yell, “Good luck, Yuuri!”

\-----

_The rest of the week passes in silence. Yuuri, fresh out of his teaching position, wanders the halls and drinks an endless amount of green tea. He meets his substitute and wishes her luck in teaching magical ethics. The students pointedly avoid him and his ex-colleagues wonder why he still hadn’t left loudly behind his back._

  
_It could be worse._  

\-----

Yuuri is halfway through packing his stuff- he could’ve used magic for this, but he wanted to make this moment last as long as he could, when there was a series of knocks on his door.

He flings another stack of books into his duffel bag and answers it, plastering a grin on his face.

Someone flings himself around Yuuri’s waist, hugging him tightly. From the blond hair with its distinctive red streak, he knows it is Minami, one of his favourite students (yes, he did have preferences).

“I’ll miss you, Katsuki-sensei!” The small boy looks up with his eyes large and watery. “I’m so sorry! I’ll miss you so much!”

“Please don’t leave!” He sounds so close to crying, Yuuri wonders what made Minami like him so much. He had been teaching the younger since he was eight, when he first came to Mahoutokoro as a teacher. Perhaps they had a bond, both coming from  
families. “They can’t make you leave!”

Yuuri ruffles Minami’s hair and eases himself out of the hug. “Thank you for your support, Minami-kun.”

“My mom made you daifuku.” Minami holds out two slightly wind-battered boxes of sweets.

“I can’t possibly take this-”

“She made them just for you, Katsuki-sensei.” Minami thrusts the two gifts into his hands.

“Tell Kenjirou-san thank you for me then.” Yuuri cracks a small smile, a real one this time.

“I made you this.” Minami shows him a snow globe with a moving figure inside. Yuuri could see a little miniature Mahoutokoro in the background, with snow falling. “It’s you, skating.”

Yuuri takes in a strangled breath, him, _skating_.

"Are you alright, sensei?"

“This is beautiful, Minami-kun.” A tiny man wearing Yuuri’s blue-framed glasses was skating on a frozen pond in lazy circles. It must’ve taken an advanced charm to make it move this way, which was impressive for a twelve year old. The boy blushes and ducks his head. “I don’t deserve this.”

Minami sticks out his bottom lip and shoves the entire globe into his hands on top of the two boxes. He bows respectfully. “Please take it!”

“I think I will. Thank you.” Yuuri says and vanishes the tokens away into his bag. “You’re a good kid, Minami.”

“Please come back!” The student breaks the silence with another embrace, this time it was tighter. “I don’t care about what the others say about you, you are the best sensei ever!”

“I’ll miss you, Minami-kun.” The black-haired man wraps his arms around his student. “I really will. Keep on skating.”

“I will!” Minami promises, jumping up and hitting Yuuri’s nose. His ashamed expression was enough to make Yuuri forget the pain and laugh.

“I’ll get the rest of the club to send you letters!” Of course, the Mahoutokoro skating club only had a few members left after the incident, but Yuuri will appreciate the gestures. No doubt, Minami already knew where to send his letters to. “See you again, Katsuki-sensei!”

“Goodbye!” Yuuri calls fondly as the sixth grader hurries down the corridor back to the dorms.

He returns to his room and exhales, taking out his wand. Everything flies into his duffel and his packing is complete. Yuuri wanted to leave.

\-----

Yuuri leaves in the early hours, when everyone else was asleep. He looks at the palace, the exquisite carvings glowing richly in the sunlight and feels the slight breeze on his skin as the storm pestrel flies beyond the school wards. He'll miss this place.

He apparates from the docks to his family home, in Hasetsu. Yuuri hasn’t been back for god knows how long, but his family has to know about his incident, Yuuko would have told them.

Yuuri misses the quiet town and the salty smell of the sea. He liked walking down the nearly deserted streets and looking around, the scenery had barely changed after five years of being away.

“I’m home!” He announces, breathing in the familiar scents of cooking rice and bath salts.

“Yuuri!” His mother cries, Yuuri feels a jolt in his heart, he didn’t realise he missed home this much until he returned. “He’s back!”

Hiroko hugs her son, beaming brightly. Yuuri gets a good look at her, she had aged some, though her hair was no longer brown and her face was more wrinkled, she still had the same beautific smile. “ _Kaasan."_

Yuuri was crying again, overcome with a sudden sadness.

Hiroko rubs comforting circles on Yuuri’s back. “It’s alright, Yuuchan, we know already.”

Mari’s drawl could be heard from where he was, in his mother’s comforting arms. “You have some explaining to do, little brother.”

\----

He tells them that he would be staying until he received a letter (rejection or otherwise) and skips over the incident. The tears he had shed had soaked the tatami floor, Yuuri cleans it up with a subtle spell.

His family doesn’t dig further, even though Mari raised her eyebrows doubtfully when he told them the incident hadn’t been too serious.

Yuuri stays in his old room, where posters of Viktor Nikiforov are peeling off the walls. He should’ve told his mom to replace the tape every year.

He was a fan of the skater, after watching him skate at the Tokyo Exhibition Gala with the skating club in an arena packed to the brim with wizards from all over the world. He remembered the graceful movements of the silver-haired man as he danced across the ice. Viktor Nikiforov won his first gold medal at the _himaho_  
Junior Grand Prix Finals that same year.

He’s not sure if he still likes him now, since the twenty seven year old had virtually vanished after winning his fifth consecutive Grand Prix medal. And the ice bought back such painful memories that Yuuri thinks he should give up figure skating for good.

The largest poster, one of the Russian posing in his 2013 SP outfit, winks at him mockingly. Yuuri rolls over in his bed, gets up, and takes the whole stash of twenty seven copyrighted Viktor Nikiforov posters off his walls and stuffs them into the bottom of his closet.

\-----

Yuuri heads down to the rink, just to say hello to Yuuko and her himaho husband, Takeshi.

“Yuuri!” The brunette squeals as he enters the rink during cleaning hours. The ice was being sculpted to perfect smoothness by deft strokes of Yuuko’s wand. “You’re here!”

They don’t talk about the incident, Yuuri doesn’t talk at all and lets Yuuko fill the silence with her chatter.

“I want to meet the triplets.” He mentions. Yuuri had seen pictures, the girls were cute and ridiculously named after ice skating moves.

“Little devils.” Yuuko smiles sweetly. “But I love them. I think you’ll see them soon, they’ll be coming here after school.”

He does meet Axel, Lutz, and Loop. Yuuri manages to tell them apart, thanks to the colour coordinated headbands. They bounced around him and spoke to him about school.

“Are you three going to Mahoutokoro next year?” He asks, kneeling down to their level.

“No.” They say in perfect unison. “We are going to one of the academies of magic near here.”

The academies of magic were schools set up with the ministry after Mahoutokoro couldn’t deal with the sudden boom of magical children in the twentieth century. These days Yuuri’s alma mater only took in the children of elite Japanese wizards and anyone else who could pass the trials.

Yuuri did make it through the trials, which had passed in sort of a blur for him, but he supposed it wasn’t that hard. He still viewed it as the event that sucked away all his lifelong luck.

“That’s great.” Yuuri says warmly. “Is it the Chugoku, Shikoku and Kyushu one?”

They nod and with a cautionary glance at their mother, who is tidying up the counter, they whip out their phones.

“Yuuri-san, skate something for us!” Axel (blue headband) pleads.

“Mama says you are one of the best skaters!” Loop (lilac ribbons) exclaims.

“Please show us!” Lutz (pink hairband) begs, waving her recorder.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t feel like skating.” Yuuri already feels a bit queasy, like he had eaten something that didn’t agree with him. “Maybe next time, alright?”

The triplets share a disappointed look, but they put away their recording devices all the same.

“Please skate for us next time!” Loop demands, regaining some of her enthusiasm.

“You have to show us!” Axel says determinedly.

“He doesn’t want you three to bother him now.” Yuuko reappears, holding a tray of chilled mugicha. “Would you like to stay for snacks?”

“No, sorry, I promised Mari I would help tidy all the guest rooms at the inn.” Yuuri says sheepishly, wishing he could stay, but her sister said she could use some magical cleaning up spells around the inn. “I’ll come tomorrow, if you’ll have me.”

“We’ll always have you here, you’re a family friend.” Yuuko chirps, while her daughters scarf down the red bean buns. “You’ll be welcome at Ice Castle Rink.”

The tray hovers in the air as Yuuko hugs him tightly. “Bye, Yuuri.”

“Bye, Yuuko!” Yuuri swishes his wand and disapparates.

\----

It had been more than a month since Yuuri had arrived in Hasetsu and he still hadn’t gotten a letter.

How did he know it had been a month? Time was measured by the delivery of Mari’s _BeWitched_ , a wizarding magazine she had been obsessed with since he bought back a copy from his school days.

It helped to know that magic had already been fully accepted by Mari the skeptic, who hadn’t even batted an eyelash when the ministry worker turned the table to a duck. One of the editors of the fashion magazine was one of Yuuri’s contemporaries and had offered everyone a discount on subscriptions at a reunion party.

The editor, wearing the exact golden dress featured on the cover of the fall edition that year, gave Yuuri a promise on half prices for every copy he bought. Mari had been reading the magazine since her brother had subscribed with her interest in mind, and soon every second monday of the month was marked with the appearance of a glossy magazine in her room.

It was this magazine that bought Yuuri to the attention of the passing of time. He had to find something of a job, he didn’t want to stay at the inn without doing anything.

Mari turns another page and the smell of perfume fills the room, making Yuuri’s head spin. The mop was swirling around the room, the piles of dust vanished, and the windows had been newly cleaned. And his sister didn’t even lift a finger.

“I wish I could wear this.” Mari shows him a picture of a smirking model wearing a paisley headband and a leather jacket that somehow worked with the flowy dress she was posing in.

“That looks nice.” He remarks offhandedly and waves his hand, the walls of the room turn whiter.

“Isn’t this your crush, Yuuri?” His sister points out a page where Viktor Nikiforov is smiling his gold-medal winning smile. Yuuri had always thought the upturned lips looked plastic and stiff, but that was his own opinion.

“He’s not my crush, Mari.” But he looks at the page all the same.

 _An exclusive interview with five-time GPF and seven-time WSC champion, Viktor Nikiforov, on life off ice._  
  
He skims the article, most of the stuff were things he already knew and stops at one line.

“It is currently unconfirmed that Nikiforov is going to take another season off to pursue a teaching career?”

“He _is_  getting old.” Mari says matter-of-factly. “But talk about brains _and_ beauty.”

“In France?”

Yuuri had already apparated to his room in a blink when Mari opens her mouth to say to the spot where her brother once stood. “Isn’t that where you’re supposed to get the job at, Yuuri?”

\----

Yuuri decides to act. He was past waiting at his point, reasoning that he didn’t have much to lose anyway.

He pens a polite letter to Madame Baranovskaya that night, asking for her to consider him for the post of charms professor. Haru, his silvery grey owl, is shaken from her rest and nips his ear as he whispers the name of the recipient.

She flies away into the darkness, the envelope clutched in her beak.

Vicchan, his small poodle, twelve years old now but with enough youth potions he should be doing just fine for the next decade, yaps and leaps into Yuuri’s arms. Sometimes he wished he could talk to his dog, it should be possible, there should be a spell for this sort of thing.

He would be a good confidant, dogs don’t judge anyone. They were nice and cuddly with no ulterior motives. Yuuri had had Vicchan since he was a little boy, when he had to get special permission from the headmaster to take a puppy to school. Sadly his dog wasn’t allowed on school grounds after that.

“What do you think, Vicchan?” He asks the dog who licks his face as if to say:  
“Do you think I’ll get it?” Vicchan licks his face again, Yuuri laughs and wipes the slobber off with his hand. “I mean it’s at a pretty famous school and I’m a guy who ‘endangered’ his students.”

His dog barks and paws at his stomach. “I know, I’m getting fat, but I still practice ballet. I’m not going to skate ever again though, that’s for sure.”

Yuuri holds the poodle closer to him, enjoying the warmth. He tries to speak some French. “Um,  _c’est mon poodle_ , _Vicchan_. _Mon nom est Katsuki Yuuri. C’est un pleasure? C’est un plaisair de vous recontrer."_

  
“ _Veuillez m'être gentil_.” He says, stumbling over the words. Yuuri was still slightly rusty, but he had danced ballet long enough to pick up a few phrases here and there. “ _Je suis le-_ ”

A sharp knock on his wall interrupts him. The walls of the inn were thin and he hopes he hadn’t disturbed someone. 

“Shut up and go to sleep, Yuuchan.” It was his sister, voice muffled but clear enough. “You’re talking to yourself again.”

\---

Maybe writing a letter was all it took to get Madame Baranovskya’s attention.

A reply was bought back within the week. Haru looked like someone had been feeding her, her feathers were glowing and she had gotten a bit larger.

True, the missive had been written by the vice headmaster, and the whole message of six sentences boiled down to: _you have been accepted, congratulations_ ; but Yuuri was over the moon.

“Leaving so soon?” His mother pipes up as he shows his family the gold-embossed stationery.

“It seems very fancy.” His father says, feeling the smooth texture of the paper. “Our Yuuri’s going off to some special school in France.”

“You’re leaving, huh?” Mari pokes her head out of the kitchen. “Bring back some souvenirs, _ototo_.”

“Are you sure you can handle it?” Mother is saying worriedly. “It’s another country, in _Europe_."

“I’ll be fine.” Yuuri vows. “It’ll be fun.”

He doesn’t know for sure how fun it’ll be, but spending so much time researching French education wasn’t for nothing and Yuuri has finished his lesson plans by the time the August issue of BeWitched arrives.

Minako and Minami send him cards, cute ones with dancing dogs and encouraging words. Minako’s words were somewhere along the lines of: _Good luck and don't embarrass me._

“It’s been confirmed.” Mari slaps her brother’s sleeping body with her new magazine one morning. “Your Viktor’s coming to France for a break.”

Yuuri opens his eyes blearily, his glasses settle neatly on the tip of his nose as he sits up to frown at Mari. “He’s not my Viktor.”

Then the realization comes onto him. The lamp Mari had switched on flickers, his nightstand falls over with a crash. “WHAT?”

\----

Vicchan sniffs the buns Yuuri puts in front of him that he made specially with his longevity recipe. His dog might have had the special treat a few times before, but animals didn’t enjoy magic a lot, especially not when they have to eat it.

“Come on, Vicchan.” He says pleadingly, pushing the bowl closer to the poodle. “They’re good for you.”

“Have you tried putting meat in them?” His father suggests.

“Magic doesn’t work that way.” Yuuri replies while Vicchan lays down on the floor, ignoring his master completely.

“He’s still just a dog.” His father says, squatting down to stroke Vicchan’s fur. “Are you bringing him to your new school?”

“All well-trained pets are allowed at Beauxbatons. I’m not sure Vicchan is well-trained though.” The dog finally reluctantly lifts his head to nibble tentatively at the bun.

“Your mother asks if you wanted to bring the old recipe book, in case you miss the food here.”

“I can’t eat any more katsudon, _otousan_.” Yuuri shakes his head. “I’ll swell up like a pig.”

His father pokes teasingly at Yuuri’s stomach, where the remaining fat could not be sweated off no matter how much he ran. “Ah, so cute, just like your mother.”

“I’ll bring the cookbook.” Yuuri says after a moment of listening to Vicchan devour a single bun in a bite, his hunger finally getting the better of him. “Vicchan will miss the katsudon.”

\-------

The Palace of Beauxbatons was gorgeous. Seeing its graceful facade, untouched by its modest seven hundred years, and the way the glass planes of its famous greenhouses sparkled in the morning sun, Yuuri felt out of place here in his second-best robes and uncombed hair.

He touches his head lightly with his wand and the hair slicks back by itself, not a conventional hairstyle, but it would have to do.

“I’ll take your luggage, sir.” One of the house mistresses offers as he walks into the grand front hall. “Madame Baranovskya’s office is up those stairs, down the hallway on the left, you’ll know the entrance when you see it. Answer her question honestly.”

“Merci.” He answers in French. His luggage is vanished and the blonde takes Vicchan’s leash with a thin smile.

He bows as soon as he enters the headmistress’s office. The entrance really had been something with the nymph sitting on a glowing stone, asking him a question. It was certainly different from Minako’s, Madame Baranovskya’s office was neater and had the elegance of something out of an architectural magazine.

The woman herself was taller than Yuuri, but the garish lemon yellow robes she was wearing offset her stern expression. She doesn’t say a word as she lunges at him, forcing open his mouth. “Hmm, not the best, but you’ll do.”

"Wand." Yuuri hands him his wand, thankfully it had been polished yesterday. "Not bad, cherrywood, 10 inches, and the core?"

"Kitsune whisker." He responds and she gives it back to him with her lips pursed.

Lilia notes Katsuki’s slender frame, long arms and legs. She speaks in English. “Minako referred you to this school, she says you also have some experience with ballet.”

“Oui, Madame.” Yuuri says delicately.

“You must show me some time.” She feels his muscles through the baggy robes as she holds his arms. “Now, sit. You have to sign the contract.”

Yuuri reads the contract, scratching out some terms and adding his own conditions.

He uses the enormous swan feather quill, much more used to using horse-hair brushes, to write. Yuuri signs it with a flourish and the ink seeps into the paper, his hands glow blue. The terms were binding.

“Classes start on the first of September. Here’s your schedule and a map.” Madame Baranovskaya banishes the contract and Yuuri finds a file of papers on his lap. “Yes, unlike Hogwarts, we would prefer any new addition to Beauxbatons familiar to their surroundings.”

“Thank you, Madame.” Yuuri nods.

“Why don’t you have some tea?”

“Merci.” Yuuri accepts the floating cup and sips the warm drink. He preferred green tea more, this drink was a bit too saccharine for his liking.

“You speak French, no?” The headmistress’ English was tinged with the harder tones of Russian, though she still spoke fluently.

“Yes, Madame.”

“I expect all classes to be conducted in this language.” She adds. "If not, find Professeur Giacometti for a translating spell."

They make some small talk in French, or rather Madame Baranovskaya spoke and Yuuri nodded along. He was never very good at talking about the weather, his hobbies and favourites in a professional setting, especially not in front of the world-renowned ex-prima ballerina.

Eventually, Yuuri senses that the brunette was getting bored, even if she didn’t show it, and excuses himself.

“I pray that you are a good addition in the classrooms of this prestigious academy.” She says, a severe parting word. “That’s all.”

\----

  
Yuuri makes his way to his room, he could’ve taken one of the passageways that led directly from the main building to the staff quarters, but the ‘slightly volatile’ scribbled next to the path made it lose some of its glamour.

So he took the scenic route, wandering past the rose gardens with their unopened buds, avoiding the maze and finds no one else on the grounds this time of the year.

There was some movement among the trees, probably wood sprites of some sort, and the gargouille guarding the gates to the quarters seem to turn their heads to watch him pass.

With a simple wave of his wand, his bag unpacks itself. The books arrange themselves onto the shelves and his clothes fly into the large wardrobe. Minami’s snowglobe is placed gently onto his new desk in the study. It was a much more spacious apartment than his room in Mahoutokoro, he even had a sitting room, where Vicchan was asleep on the carpet.

Feeling tired from the eight hour time difference, Yuuri decides to check out his new classrooms in the morning and instead go to a close place that his map had labelled ‘spa’. He changes his robes into a comfortable sweater and jeans wandlessly. The waistband of his jeans were tight, he still had some weight to lose.

Leaving a bowl of kibble for Vicchan when he woke and his wand on top of the files, Yuuri wanders into a secluded nook outside of his quarters, where three paths diverged. One was marked ‘female’, another ‘male’, and the last one ‘other’.

He chose the ‘male’ path and stows his map into the pocket of his robes. There were lights fluttering along the marble path, Yuuri takes a closer look and gasps. _Fae_? He didn’t know that there were fairfolk here at the school.

The one he had observed was making angry noises that sounded like bells chiming at being seen, its acid green eyes flash as it dives for Yuuri, knocking his glasses off and kicking his nose.

Yuuri blinks, lost without his glasses. He leans down to pick them up and repairs the broken lenses. When he put them back on again, the fierce fairy was gone.

The spa itself consisted of four major pools with smaller individual baths at the side, one looked like there was actual lava in it. Yuuri would know, Mahoutokoro was built above one after all. The other three were different from a typical hot spring from home, everything was so European. There was no curtain for modesty, although the statues were excellent, almost anyone could come upon this place.

He walks further on and stops when he sees a head poking out of the water. The exit was too far from here. Yuuri skirts away from the man, trying to stay as quiet as possible, because a glamour is not something you could do without a wand.

It was strange for a man to be here this time of the year, he must be one of the early arrivals, or a house master. Yuuri, overtaken by curiosity, twists his head to peek when he see the man staring back at him.

He finds himself drawn to the steely blue gaze, he almost looks fam-

Yuuri lowers his eyes as the man stands, from what he could tell he wasn’t wearing a thing. He wipes the fog away from his glasses without magic, trying to find something to do with his hands.

 _Oh_. Angular cheekbones, lips pale pink, face flushed from the cold, and the water streaking off his sculpted body in glittering rivers. Yuuri blushes as he meets the man’s inquisitive look with some hesitation, embarrassed to have been caught ogling.

“Hello.” The silver hair was unmistakable, and he wasn’t that dense not to hear the Russian accent lacing his words. Yuuri inhales sharply as he realized that the man in front of him was the actual Viktor Nikiforov, his childhood idol in the flesh. “You must be the new professor from Japan, I’m new too! My name is Viktor Nikiforov.”

“Please, call me Viktor.” He winks, smiling like the sun was coming out, with a flip of his hair.

That was the last straw. Yuuri squeaks in shame, forgets how to breathe and turns into a plump fox.

\----

 


	2. A Proper Meet-Cute

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yuuri finds his way around.

Yuuri comes to it.

 

He gets up in separate stages.

 

First there is the blurry eyesight and the aching head from a transformation. Then there is the wrinkling of a nose that he realizes wasn’t a human one and the prickling of the ears at the sounds of water running.

 

Finally, with a burst of mortification, he curls up into a ball of red fur, snuggling into the soft white towel that was draped over him. _Was that really Viktor Nikiforov? Had he really just fainted in front of internationally renowned Viktor Nikiforov?_

 

Yuuri had always thought there was a limit to his daily dose of personal humiliation, but apparently fate just had to one up him. _Swooning_ in front of your idol was on a whole other level. He didn’t mean to collapse, so he contributed it to his exhaustion and the shock of seeing another human being emerge stark-naked in front of you.

 

Yuuri decides he should do better the next time they meet and then Viktor would probably label him in his mind as the ‘man who barged in on my bath when I was naked and vulnerable’. That was his first impression on his colleague. Viktor Nikiforov was his _colleague_.

 

He closes his eyes in mortification.

 

Said colleague was likely laughing with his peers about the strangest thing he saw while bathing, and Yuuri did not want to be the main character in a story people tell at gatherings. He’ll laugh it off if he ever brings it up.

 

He gets to his paws, nearly slipping on the smooth marble floor, and picks up his glasses delicately with his mouth. Yuuri shrugs off the towel and lifts his paw to take a step forward.

 

One of the glowing balls of light (attendants, he realized) butts him in the head. Yuuri barely manages from dropping his glasses, _what in the name of Seimei?_

 

“ _Animaux interdits_!” The luminous ball cries out indignantly, alerting the other attendants in the spa.

 

Yuuri wants to open his mouth, but he couldn’t without abandoning his glasses. And even then, foxes hardly made any sounds. He knows he should change back but in the heat of the moment, being chased by intensely white lights, his mind is blank as he flees from the spa to the safety of the path,.

 

He trots down the golden path somewhat leisurely, liking the feel of his tail swishing behind him. Yuuri has never given much thought as to why his animagi form was a fox, Minako’s was an elegant swan, which was self-explanatory for the former ballerina, and he thinks the Calligraphy teacher in Mahoukotoro was capable of transforming into a lion.

 

His own fox form seems to pale in comparison to the dozens of witches and wizards in Japan who were animagi. Yuuri supposes being one was difficult enough, but he had read some articles on how a person’s animagus form was related to their personality and there was nothing foxy about him.

 

Yuuri traces his steps back to the garden, following the lights of the Beauxbaton Palace at night and his nose. He peeks inside the maze, marvelling at the moving vines and shivering fronds. There was something almost otherworldly about the way the hedges moved even when he felt no breeze.

 

He’ll explore when he walks Vicchan tomorrow, he decides.

 

He changes back into his human form successfully without any animal body parts left at the entrance to the staff quarters, and stands patiently on the stairs as they take him up to his room.

 

“Thank you.” He pats the banister awkwardly, thanking the building for the help. The light on his door glows brighter in response.

 

Vicchan raises his head as he walks in, before jumping onto Yuuri. Thankfully he wasn’t that heavy enough to knock over his master.

 

“Hi, Vicchan.” Yuuri greets his dog with an affectionate smile and cuddles him. “I missed you.”

 

He checks the blue bowl he had placed in the kitchen, it was filled to the brim with homemade kibble. Yuuri picks up his wand from the nightstand and flicks it towards the poodle. A small bone instantly appears beside the dog, who dives into it eagerly.

 

He yawns and stretches his arms. The time difference was taking its toll on both of them. Yuuri waves his wand once, and his clothes change into loose pajamas. He taps his teeth with his wand and they are cleaned, one added benefit was the minty feeling in his mouth afterwards.

 

The man leaps into his bed, the blankets move to cover his tired form. Yuuri is dimly aware of Vicchan’s small body snuggling up next to him, warming his sides as he falls asleep.

 

\----

 

Yuuri wakes up in stages.

 

There is the gooey but not unpleasant sensation of Vicchan’s tongue across his cheek. Then there is the sunlight streaming into his room, the feeling warm against his eyelids, despite the fact that the curtains had been closed when Yuuri had fallen asleep. He rolls over, arm around his dog, and pulls the covers higher about him, not wanting to leave the bed.

 

Eventually, Vicchan gets bored of staying in bed and squirms out of Yuuri’s grip, leaping above the man and onto the ground.

 

Groaning, Yuuri opens his eyes and the room swims before his glasses settle themselves neatly on his nose.

 

“ _Ohayo_ , Vicchan.” Yuuri mumbles, climbing out of his bed. “I’ll give you a walk later, alright?”

 

Yuuri makes his way blearily to the bathroom, one of the few places he hadn’t yet seen in the building. The fireplace that was the centerpiece of the small apartment took him to a few places in the staff quarters, the library, common room and the communal baths.

 

The large oak fireplace with lilies and a gaudy school crest engraved into the wood, reminded Yuuri of the silk screens back in Mahoutokoro. Passing them would take a person to the place they want to go- within school perimeters of course. The fireplace takes him to the bathroom in a kaleidoscope of blue and gold. Yuuri stumbles out of the fireplace and into the bright, lemon-scented room.

 

It was silent in the gilded baths, the only sounds being the light tread of his feet. Nobody was inside. The frescoes shimmered as they switched images between mermaids, flying horses, and fae brushing their hair.

 

In the face of such opulence, Yuuri is too tired to begin to feel out of place but he gets through his routine efficiently. He touches the shadows beneath his eyes and reaches for his lotion (for what? There was no one here to look at him.)

 

He looks up to apply it and to his surprise, there were no bags under his eyes in his reflection. His skin appeared smoother and his cheekbones more prominent. It was like a warped version of a beauty filter.

 

“Strange.” Yuuri touches his face. He hadn’t exercised since the incident and the fat really was making a comeback. But the him in the mirror was more or less the same as him, only thinner.

 

“What do you think?” A chirpy voice interrupts his thoughts.

 

“I didn’t know that Beauxbatons had talking mirrors.” He admires the frame, red glaze intertwined with gold and a generous use of sparkles. "Good morning."

 

“Well you do now.” The mirror says almost smugly. “You also look much _so_ better.”

 

“So you're that kind of mirror.” Yuuri frowns, the forehead of his reflection hardly creases. The mirror hums in agreement. “Can I see myself now?”

 

“You aren't like most people.” The mirror seems to reluctantly change his reflection back. “Tell you the truth, you already look beautiful.”

 

“Thanks.” Yuuri says, not taking the words of an enchanted mirror to mind.

 

“I'm Yuuri.” He adds to fill the silence, reaching for his moisturiser.

 

“You can call me Phichit.”

 

“Hi Phichit.”

 

“You use that brand? I hear it's Korean cosmetics that are in fashion nowadays.” If Yuuri squinted, he could just about see a flickering face in the glass, and bright eyes peering at him curiously. “Of course, the Japanese moisturisers are pretty good, people have such good skin there.”

 

Yuuri has the feeling that he had just been complimented. “Thank you?”

 

“My friend, Seung-Gil, he's a painting somewhere on the third floor, told me that.” Phichit informs brightly. “Are you a professor?”

 

Yuuri nods.

 

“You look young enough to be like one of our international students!” Phichit exclaims. “You really do have great skin.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“I used to be a student here, you know.” Phichit chats on chirpily as Yuuri slathers his face with moisturizer. The shop that sold it in Kyoto gave a full set to him to free so long as he mentioned the brand in his next interview (he didn’t give a lot of those but the reporters were always so insistent for some reason). “I graduated a few years ago and left behind this enchanted mirror.”

 

“Like a magic painting?”

 

“I majored in spellcasting here.” If Phichit had shoulders, Yuuri was sure he would’ve shrugged. “This mirror was my thesis.”

 

“It’s nice.” Yuuri says truthfully. The spellwork on Phichit’s mirror was far better than anything he had ever made up.

 

“What did you do for your graduation thesis?” Phichit asks, his glowing eyes bright with curiosity.

 

Yuuri sighs, his thesis had been alright, but it still made him shudder to think about it. “I made up a spell that could help a wizard or which achieve flight.”

 

“That’s one of the hardest fields ever! Did it succeed?”

 

“It worked well enough, I actually got inspiration for it from the British dark wizard Voldemort.” He had been reading about how the wizard had turned into something like ‘smoke’ during attacks for his world history class. “He flew unaided, but there was this not aesthetically appealing smoke form that I improved on.” He coughs. “It worked relatively well.”

 

“That’s brilliant!”

 

Yuuri flushes, his old professor hadn’t exactly gaped when he floated into the air, having used a spell to lower the weight of his body to that like almost a speck of dust, enabling him to float in the air and fly around the room.

 

He had quickly lost control of his body and hurtled out of the assessment room at breaking speed, into the open, where he had to do a series of complicated aerobics just to get to the ground. It had seemed like every student and teacher had wandered out onto the grounds just to watch Yuuri making a fool of himself in the air.  

 

Yuuri put that moment in his **Top 10 Humiliating and Embarrassing Moments** , and suffice to say, tried not to use that spell when possible. Phichit wisely does not bring the thesis up again.

 

The rest of his morning routine was punctuated by Phichit telling him how he had scared Professor Lee when she had came in to brush her teeth. Professor Lee taught Transfiguration and used strict methods to keep her students in line.

 

“She works the Chinese students here hard, seeing how few there actually are.” Phichit tells him sagely. "Beauxbatons has a rule against corporal punishment but that lady dishes out detentions like sweets."

 

“Professor Giacometti is Swiss and he was in his final year here when I enrolled on a scholarship.” Yuuri recalled Madam Baranovskaya mentioning a Giacometti. “He’s nice, but a little too much sometimes. He teaches arithmancy, and worked on the simultaneous translating spell he teaches to all the students.”

 

“I’ve heard of that.” Yuuri had read an article about a young Swiss arithmancer and his partner succeeding in the improvement of a translating spell.

 

“He was made a professor in Beauxbatons a year later. You’ll see him in the Conservatory a lot, there’s a rink there.”

 

“A rink?” Yuuri tries to keep his voice calm. The image of smiling Japanese students come to mind and he shakes his head.

 

“Yeah, an ice-skating rink.” Phichit explains. “It’s a Beauxbatons tradition to hold an annual Winter Festival there but otherwise the rink remains unused for the rest of the year. Although I’m sure this year it won’t be the case, what with the Russian Magical Figure-Skating Team arriving.”

 

“The entire team?”

 

“Not the entire team. Haven’t you read the news?” Phichit asks, eyebrow raised. Yuuri would argue that enchanted mirrors don’t exactly get around much, but he holds his tongue. “They say Viktor Nikiforov will be teaching and training to make his great comeback here.”

 

“Really?” Yuuri’s voice sounds higher pitched than usual.

 

“I heard it from a reliable source.”

 

“Seung-gil?”

 

“You remembered!” Phichit grins. “Yes, Seung-gil did tell me that he overheard Viktor talking to his coach on the phone-”

 

“You have internet here?”

 

“Just in one room, did you read the map yet? It’s on the fifth floor of the main building.”

 

“Do you mind if I leave and come back later? I want to call a friend.”

 

“Sure.” Phichit says and trails off wistfully. “You’re the first person to ask if I minded.”

 

“Thanks.” Yuuri stuffs his things quickly into the poodle-patterned makeup bag and tries to retrace his steps to the fireplace.

 

“Go left.” Phichit supplies helpfully.

 

“Thank you.” Yuuri rushes out of the eerily empty bathing room, and stumbles into the fireplace and back into his quarters.

 

Vicchan barks, his tongue sticking out of his mouth, wagging his fluffy tail happily.

 

“Oh right.” Yuuri picks up his wand and waves it, forming a leash connected to Vicchan’s blue collar. “Let’s go for a walk and then you can come with me to call Yuuko.”

 

* * *

 

He sees the same house mistress who had welcomed him on one of the tree lined paths leading to the gardens, talking with a group that Yuuri thought must be the early student arrivals.

 

She waves at him cheerfully, and he waves back before carrying on, missing the disappointed flash in the blonde’s eyes and the curious looks of the people with her.

 

Yuuri unfastens the leash and lets Vicchan run in the garden freely. Like the rest of Beauxbatons, the garden was almost _too_ luxurious and boasted a wide variety of flora and fauna. The explosions of colour and heady scent were completely different from Mahoutokoro’s minimalist bamboo forest and sakura trees.

 

He was admiring a towering hedge that changed its shape now and then into the same man doing a different pose (a golden plaque explained that he was a previous headmaster from the seventeenth century who was quite keen on gardening) when Vicchan barks.

 

Yuuri turns and there he was. Viktor Nikiforov, former face of Armani Prive (he would know, he still had the posters), smiling at the dogs and looking handsome in a chic white polo shirt and black jeans, with his poodle beside him,who was nosing Vicchan.

 

Viktor was squatting and speaking to the dogs in Russian as Yuuri carefully walks towards him, feeling unkempt in his worn t-shirt and ill-fitting sweats.

 

“ _Bonjour_! Is this-” Viktor begins and then stops mid sentence to stare directly into Yuuri’s eyes, his gaze cutting and unreadable.

 

Yuuri feels like the Russian was staring right into him and fights the unmistakable urge to flee. Instead he throws up a mental wall, in case the man proves himself to be a Legilimens (the Russian school taught Occulmency and Legilmency as part of their DADA course after all). At least Viktor wasn’t naked this time.

 

“You were the one in the spa yesterday, I’d remember your eyes anywhere.” He stands gracefully, his blue eyes never once moving away from Yuuri’s brown ones. He seemed to be waiting for something.

 

He feels his cheeks warm and decides to make a move. “Umm…”

 

“Do you always turn into a fox when you are startled?” Slim hands move up to hold his face delicately, Yuuri couldn’t even begin to imagine how red his face must be. “Or is it just when you see naked men?”

 

Something comes out of him, and his voice is unusually deep when he protests, “N-No!”

 

“Hmm.” Viktor hums, Yuuri feels his hands stroking his chin, and struggles to keep his heart from pumping too quickly. _Twenty two year olds don’t get heart attacks, don’t they?_ “Shame.”

 

“Your dog is cute.” Yuuri says at last after a moment of awkward silence, surprised at how cool he sounded. “He looks just like a larger version of my Vicchan. What’s it’s name?”

 

Viktor gives him a sharp look of consideration before smiling, now _this_  was a real smile, Yuuri senses, not the one he gave in photoshoots. The smile lit up his face and crinkled his eyes. “This is Makkachin. She’s a good girl.”

 

“Hello, Makkachin.” Yuuri kneels down and greets his idol’s dog, he couldn’t believe he was doing this. Touching his idol’s dog and talking to Viktor Nikiforov without stammering, it felt like he was floating in a dream.

 

He looks at Viktor from under his lashes. “She’s-”

 

Yuuri will never know what he planned to say because at that moment Makkachin knocks him over enthusiastically onto the sandy path, and Vicchan starts licking at him.

 

“Vicchan!” Yuuri tries to bat away his dog’s licks to fix his glasses. “ _Yamate_!”

 

“Makkachin.” Viktor says sternly, moving to restrain his dog, but he couldn’t keep the amusement from his voice. “I’m sorry, she’s not normally like that.”

 

“Like what?” Yuuri lets out a small laugh, his cheeks pinking again as he accepts Viktor’s offered hand to steady himself. “She’s an angel.”

 

Viktor is staring at him again. _Did he have something on his face?_

 

That was when Yuuri remembered to introduce himself. “I’m Katsuki Yuuri, the new Charms professor. Pleased to meet you.”

 

“I’m Viktor Nikiforov, the new junior potions teacher.” Viktor says smoothly. “Charmed.”

 

Yuuri blinks. _Did he just make a pun?_ No matter, Yuuri is giving into his sense to flee and quickly makes an excuse.  “It-It’s been nice talking to you and playing with Makkachin but I have to go call a friend from home.”

 

“Of course.” Viktor smiles again, this time without the glow in his brilliantly blue eyes. “I look forward to talking with you again, Katsuki.”

 

“Yuuri please, Katsuki is my last name.” He corrects automatically and briefly feels dizzy with dismay at correcting Viktor Nikiforov.

 

“See you around, Yuuri.” The man purrs, drawing out his name, and drops a glittery wink. Yuuri sees that he was wearing a light grey eyeshadow that matched his clothes with specks of glitter mixed in.

 

 _Unfairly attractive,_ that’s what Viktor Nikiforov was.

 

He blushes once more, picks up a suddenly docile Vicchan into his arms, and walks away at a quick pace, refusing to call it running.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Animaux interdits: No animals allowed  
> Moldu: actual translation for the word muggle in the french version of HP  
> Yamate: stop
> 
> What Viktor said in Russian: something like, "aren't you just a cute little thing? Where's your owner?"
> 
> It's been 5 months or so and I finally update this story! Phichit's (the mirror, not the person) design would be a bit like his SP outfit. Viktor is wearing an Armani polo shirt and Calvin Klein jeans (not that Yuuri knows, bless his soul). 
> 
> Typical Yuuri constantly downplaying his achievements (if you squint, you'll see what I mean). Makkachin and Vicchan also definitely had a plan to get their masters together.
> 
> Meanwhile Viktor:  
> Viktor: CHRIS! IT'S AN EMERGENCY!  
> Chris:  
> Viktor: I saw the most-beautiful-man-in-the-world™ today!  
> Viktor: I winked at him.  
> Viktor: That was embarrassing, what if he thought I was a creep?  
> Viktor: He has pretty eyes.  
> Viktor: *collapses onto the ice dramatically* He's hot. *sighs dreamily*  
> Chris: *looking down* _Au contraire, mon cherie_ , the most-beautiful-man-in-the-world™ is obviously my boyfriend.


	3. Building Bridges

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Yuuri explores a part of the school and meets more of the supporting cast.

Yuuri is pretty sure his office is cursed. 

When he stopped by in his tour after the embarrassing gaffe with Viktor Nikiforov, he had noticed the dust suspended in the air, that did not move with the gentle breeze from an open window. 

_A spell done wrong_ , the House Mistress has explained quietly, while waiting for him to stop gawking at the expensive green wallpaper and tasteful wooden furniture. The office would not be out of place in a European castle. The previous occupant, he learned, had a fondness for luxury and evidently displayed it with a subtle touch. 

There were no gold or silver finishings in the spacious office unlike the rest of the school, but lush decorations and rich fabric. It was more luxuriant than Yuuri‘s spartan office at Mahoutokoro, but he felt like this was a place one grows to like. 

“Professor Nazari was a part-time cursebreaker. A noble profession, of course, but it left some marks in this office,” Madame Moreau explains, and Yuuri’s senses adjust to the barely there scorch marks on the wallpaper and the lingering smell of toast. “The school has covered it up the best we can, but some things just wouldn’t go away easily. The dust you see? Even Professor Nazari did not know where it came from, so it hasn’t been removed yet. We would understand if you wanted to switch rooms.”

“There’s no need to go to the trouble of doing that, Madame,” Yuuri says automatically, wand out, quickly casting a detection spell. “But I would like to know why Professor Nazari was allowed to remove curses on school grounds.”

Madame Moreau shrugs in the way only the French can, expressively yet also detached. “He worked here for over three decades and no one knew anything about his other activities. Only after he retired did we find the scorches and Dark Magic when we cleared his office.”

Yuuri detects no malice in the room, only the slightest bit of residual magic. Nazari must have been proficient at his part-time job then. 

“Perhaps the leftover magic will…” Yuuri searches for the right word in French. “- _manifest_ in another channel.”

“The school thinks this room is mostly harmless.” Madame Moreau says. “There might be strange happenings in other classrooms, the wallpaper changes colour, and it snows in the Première sitting rooms during the summer. You don’t quite know what to expect sometimes.”

“Teaching here must be a unique experience.”

“Well, you are free to decorate your office any way you wish. I would, however, suggest taking care of the furniture regularly, as well as informing the school before you make changes to the layout of this room,” Madame Moreau says with a wave of her hand. “The fireplace has been directly connected to your quarters for convenience.”

Yuuri pauses when he hears _your office_ , he didn’t think it was fully _his_ yet, but maybe if he didn’t mess this job up, he would feel more at home at Beauxbatons. 

“This is where I must leave you, Professor Katsuki,” Madame Moreau smiles tightly, looking at an elegant silver pocket watch with stars instead of numbers on the face . “Don’t hesitate to find me if you have any inquiries.”

“Thank you for your help.” Yuuri replies, and the blonde leaves in a whirl of grey robes hurriedly. 

His wand still out, he considers for a moment, skin tingling. He murmurs something under his breath, the office seems to quiver, and the dust in the air glows bronze for a few moments before the particles vanish, dispersing back into the atmosphere.

* * *

He finalises his junior year lesson plans that night, alone in his private room with an empty cartoon of cup noodles on his desk. Every so often he gets up and does a few stretches to remain flexible, having no idea when Madame Baranovskaya would ask him to dance for her. 

Yuuri has no idea what his future students studied alongside their previous teacher, who he gathered to be lax but capable from the painting of an old alumni hanging outside the _Terminale_ classroom.

He decides to follow the standard French charms curriculum, with some Japanese elements mixed in. Yuuri was a big believer in hands-on learning, even though he had been slow to take to certain charms when he was younger. He also had a very tight schedule, with lessons in every period.

Beauxbatons had a larger student body than Mahoutokoro, as evident in their thick yearbooks in the enormous library and the sprawling campus. He wonders why there wasn’t another Charms professor to deal with the amount of teaching that needed to be done. Yuuri hopes that he could at least try to remember the names of all his students.

He calls home again and spends five minutes having a conversation with his mother, who tells him about the fish and the sea and how there were more visitors to the inn with the tourist season coming along. 

Yuuri’s feeling of homesickness only increases when he calls Yuuko, who freaks out when he tells her softly about finally meeting the Viktor, though he did not dare give the context of that meeting. 

"So it's really true what they say about foreign countries," Yuuko had said dreamily. "Celebrities just pop up left and right. Are his eyes really as blue in real life?"

"If possible, they were even bluer." Yuuri had replied truthfully. "How are the girls?"

"Strangely excited about going to school, even though they won't be allowed to buy wands until they're ten and thank _Seimei_ for that," Yuuko had sighed. "They're already planning to invite their friends to the rink."

"Ah, that's nice." Yuuri said, voice light. "Be careful." 

He asks Madame Moreau about the packed schedule he had when he spots her in the gardens the next day with Vicchan, surprising himself with his lack of hesitation.

“You teach something we call General Charms in France,” Madame Moreau answers, there are several notebooks floating about her head, covered with cursive handwriting on internal affairs. “In the later years, students can choose other types of Charms as electives, but we typically regard Charms as one of the four core subjects. You might get older students asking if they could teach a semester of lessons to count as a service activity. That’s how professors who teach a core subject balance their workload.”

“And the students have the time to teach classes?”

“You might have to ask Professor Giacometti about that. He’s in charge of the teaching assistant program.”

Yuuri tilts his head. “I haven’t seen him around though.”

“He’s always in his office or outside school, that boy,” Not for the first time, Yuuri wonders how old Madame Moreau was. She could be somewhere from thirty to fifty, the way she looked. “He focuses on making lessons as fun and informative as possible. Chris is a favourite among students.”

“Would he mind if I ask him a few questions?”

Madame Moreau evaluates him once again with a cool gaze, as Vicchan edges closer to her. “He’ll like you, Professor Katsuki. Just don’t be shocked at how friendly he can get with his colleagues. He’s a friend of Professor Nikiforov, I remember that they were in the same house.”

* * *

Yuuri finds Professor Giacometti precisely where Madame Moreau said he would be, in his office in the East Wing. The ceiling of the corridor he had to walk to get there was painted to look like the galaxy, and there were various moving contraptions suspended in the air.

He knocks gently on the aged white door. 

“Is it you Professor Katsuki?” A voice purrs in English from behind the door. “ _Do_ come in.”

The doorknob burns his skin when he touches it, Yuuri retracts his hand, and clutches it. There was not a great deal of pain, and he thinks it might have been spelled to recognize another person’s magical signature.

The door opens automatically, and he steps into a bright, open room, different from his own overtly masculine decor, but still sophisticated. There are more machines and instruments laying on crowded desks, and hanging on the walls, which were painted a dazzling shade of purple and blue. Through the double glass doors bracketed between two tall bookshelves, Yuuri could see stars. It must be the Conservatory.

“Juliette told me to expect you, Professor, but might I say you look even better in person.” Yuuri looks at the man speaking. Professor Giacometti was a few feet above the ground, writing equations onto a chalkboard that dominated the left side of the room. There was a drawing of a cat on another. 

Said cat was currently lying on the windowsill, licking its paw casually. Professor Giacometti’s green eyes peered at Yuuri over stylish rims as he returned to the floor which made him more self-conscious about his own ordinary blue frames. 

“It’s a pleasure.” The man says with a rakish smile, holding out a hand. Yuuri takes it, and Professor Giacometti presses a chaste kiss on the back of his hand.

Yuuri thinks his cheeks must be beyond red at this point. “Nice- nice to meet you, Giacometti-san.”

“How adorable.” Professor Giacometti grins slowly, letting go of Yuuri’s hand. “Please call me Chris, everyone else does.”

“You can call me Yuuri, if you like. It's nice to meet you,” He murmurs, unsure of how to proceed. Then he remembers the purpose of his mission. “I have a few questions about the teaching assistant program.”

“You’ve come to the right person, Yuuri.” Chris declares and with a flamboyant flair of his wand, a pile of paper appears in his hand. 

He leads Yuuri to a seat before his desk with an unobtrusive touch at the small of his back. “I have a list of candidates from the upper years who have expressed interest in becoming a teaching assistant last year. Most of them had good marks in Nazari’s classes, and one or two have decided to become teachers after leaving Beauxbatons.”

“Is there a process for choosing these students?” Yuuri asks, genuinely curious. They didn’t have such a practice at the much smaller Mahoutokoro. 

“They come to find me during an application period, and I have them write an essay and attend an interview. I go over their marks and comments from other teachers,” Chris explains, watching Yuuri go over the names and history of the candidates. “We want students who can handle the responsibility of teaching, albeit for a short amount of time. I look for those who understand the subject material and can communicate effectively.”

“They all seem qualified.” Yuuri says, reading the detailed reports. “Is this for all subjects?”

“It’s just for the Cores- you won’t see a sixteen-year-old teaching Defense in Beauxbatons.”

Yuuri feels lost, looking at the foreign names of the students and their unfamiliar faces. He misses the primarily Japanese Mahoutokoro still, even after his skating incident.

Chris speaks up again, “I might have some recommendations for you. Maybe Guanghong Ji, he’s one of the few Chinese students we have, and his technique is impeccable. He would be good with the _Sixième_ classes. He’s friends with Leo de la Iglesia, from Spain, but I think Professor Nekola has already chosen him to teach Introduction to Transfiguration.”

“What about homework?”

“Teachers give their assistants a list of homework items to be completed in the semester- we have to correct them ourselves of course.” There is a photo of a handsome beach-going couple on his desk that Chris stares at occasionally with a fond look. Yuuri sees a moving picture of a group of skaters on top of a drawer near the wall as well. “The assistants are mostly there to teach and answer questions. It’s an effective method of building character.”

Chris’ cat leaps from the windowsill gracefully and slinks over to Yuuri, pinning him with sharp eyes. He reaches a hand out tentatively, and it (a female, he thinks) approaches him cautiously.

“Here’s a bunch of docs on school policy with some notes from past teachers that I think I’m going to hand over to you to keep permanently-” Chris continues, giving Yuuri thick black binders that the other man levitates in the air with a simple flick of his wrist. “You would think with magic we’d find a way to shrink information into disks like _non-magiques_.”

Yuuri wants to tell Chris that not many himaho used floppy disks to store their knowledge anymore, now that there were smartphones and USBs, but he pushes the urge down.

“Thank you.” He says instead, stroking the cat, who is beginning to purr appreciatively. “I will treasure these forever.”

Chris squints at him. “I don't know if you’re being serious or not. You’re really quite unreadable, Yuuri.”

Yuuri, who has always worn his heart on his sleeve, his emotions an open book for all to see, was unreadable?

“If you insist.”

Chris barks out a warm laugh. “You’re welcome to stop by anytime, Professor.”

* * *

There is a knock on Yuuri’s office door that night, when he is busy finishing Dumont’s _Charmes Intermediaries_ and going over past examination questions. Vicchan, who is lying in a new blue dog bed, lifts his head. 

Before answering the door, he mentally rates his clothes. Dark blue t-shirt, black sweats, and slippers. _Not his best, but then again, when does Yuuri ever look presentable?_

“Good evening-” He begins, opening the door to the sight of a maroon sweater-clad chest, and he stops. Looking up, he meets the vibrant blue eyes of one Viktor Nikiforov. 

Instantly, Yuuri feels like slamming the door and hiding until his colleague goes away, but he bites on his bottom lip, and says shakily to a man he had seen naked not that long ago. “Do you need something?”

“Hello, Yuuri!” Viktor, for the lack of a better word, beams, his white teeth sparkling. His silver hair shines luminously in the rose-tinted fairy lights of the corridor. “Are you working on lesson plans?”

Yuuri nods once, hoping that the other man could not see the mess he had made of the office in the span of two days. 

“That’s boring! Wouldn’t you rather be out in this beautiful night? I think that teaching is something that should be spontaneous, instead of being scripted-”

Yuuri could not keep himself from frowning slightly at Viktor’s words. Lesson planning was viewed as an integral part of teaching in Japan, where everything was ordered and functioned smoothly. 

“I mean I don’t think your lesson planning is boring- we just have two different styles,” Viktor’s French is so fast that Yuuri is struggling to keep up. Maybe he should’ve taken Madame Baranovskaya’s advice and asked Chris for the translation spell when he saw him today. “I just thought maybe we could spend the night together?”

Yuuri thinks he might have just misunderstood, but did Viktor just ask if they could _sleep together_? He cocks his head to the right and tries to keep calm, prompting. “For lesson planning?”

“I was hoping for dinner, maybe,” Viktor has a hand on the doorframe, and is leaning into Yuuri’s personal space. At least he wasn’t going to lose control and turn into a fox this time. “You’ve barely been in France for a week and you’re concentrating on your job at nine at night. You can do your tedious planning later, Yuuri-”

Up until this point, Yuuri hadn’t even known that there was a French word for tedious, but he was certain Viktor had indirectly insulted him, and interrupts him with a subdued. “ _Tedious_?”

“Please do not disrespect my choices,” Yuuri says, stumbling slightly over the words, something he hasn’t done since graduating from Mahoutokoro. Viktor, he notes idly, looks somewhat crestfallen. “I am still learning the education system here, and I need more time to understand it. I want to do a good job here, and I-”

Yuuri gulps in some air, thinking desperately: don’t have a breakdown in front of an international figure-skating star. Deep breaths.

“So I won’t be having dinner with you.” Yuuri finishes. “Have a good night.”

And he closes the door in Viktor Nikiforov’s face.

* * *

The next morning, instead of Vicchan licking his face, he wakes to the sound of a series of loud, violent knocks on his door.

He drags himself out of his comfortable bed (yesterday Yuuri deliberated on whether or not he’ll be able to keep it when Madame Baranovskya dismisses him), not bothering to grab his glasses, and heads towards the direction of those annoying noises. He swears someone had cast a blasting spell.

“What.” He says flatly, wrenching open the door, Vicchan at his heels.

He doesn’t see anything at eye level, until someone headbutts him, and he looks down. 

Immediately the person who had knocked on his door shoves a finger into his face- Yuuri sees strangely intense green eyes and a ferocious snarl- and starts to yell. “He’s been keeping me up all night with his _fucking_ whining, he’s a useless, pathetic old man! You better be nice and talk some sense into him-”

The young boy- Yuuri thinks those eyes weren’t entirely human- sweeps his hand to point at another person, accidentally slapping Yuuri’s nose. Even without his glasses, Yuuri could guess who that man was.

Viktor’s features swims in his blurry vision, Yuuri narrows his eyes, trying to get a clearer look. His glasses fly into his open hand, and he puts them on. 

Yes, it was Viktor Nikiforov, who he had been extremely impolite to yesterday night.

“Or else!” The boy ends with a threat hanging in the air and a heated glare. Yuuri does a double take at the bold tiger-striped shirt he was wearing and the similarly patterned sneakers. The whole outfit the boy had chosen softened the threat slightly.

Faced with no response, the boy huffs, and with one last look at Viktor, storms down the hallway.

Yuuri, not sure if being yelled at was part of the job, turns to Viktor and says pointedly. “What.” 

“I’m sorry about my… protege, he’s very spirited. Is this a bad time?” Viktor says, almost nervously, hands in his pockets, looking him up and down, probably seeing Yuuri’s post-sleep aesthetic of bedhead and ruffled clothes, and quivering with fear. “I can come back later.”

Yuuri is beginning to see a pattern here. Viktor arrives, so put-together like he had just stepped out of a magazine photoshoot in sleek outfits, and Yuuri in unstylish clothes, being the definition of a mess, every time they met. 

He prays he doesn’t have any drool on his face.

“You just woke me.” It comes out sounding much harsher than Yuuri intended it to. He hesitates before going, “I want to apologize for yesterday-”

“I should apologize first.” Viktor says abruptly, hand in his silver hair. “I was rude to you and insulted your methods. You obviously had a lot of work to do before school starts, and I disturbed your night in. I’ll try not to do it again, can you forgive me?”

Yuuri’s sluggish mind is still trying to process that and he blurts out in English, “That sounded better than what I was going to say.”

Viktor laughs and something in Yuuri melts. The other man’s laugh made him feel warm all over, or maybe it was because he wanted to go back to sleep.

“So all is forgiven?” Viktor says hopefully.

“Yes.” Yuuri replies, and yawns. 

They stand there for a minute in awkward silence. Viktor’s eyes are scanning beyond the place where Yuuri was standing and into his room. At least he hadn’t put up his posters yet.

“If that’s everything-”

“Your dog is cute-”

They both pause, having spoken at the same time. Yuuri wishes a hole could just open up in the ground and swallow him.

“I heard you saw Chris yesterday for some more information. Since you’re new to Beauxbatons, maybe we could have coffee sometime in the main hall, and talk about it. I could be your mentor, Yuuri!” Viktor says enthusiastically, forging on with a growing smile. Yuuri likes the way the other teacher drags the sounds of his name out, it was almost enough to make up for the rude awakening he had just now. “And we could walk our dogs together in the morning!”

“I don’t drink coffee.” _Why did I say that?_ Yuuri panics internally when he sees Viktor’s hurt look, and hastily adds. “But I’d like to go on a walk with you.”

Viktor exhales, his blue eyes lighting up. “That’s wonderful. Meet me outside Etienne Hall tomorrow at eight, Yuuri.”

“Don’t bring your protege to wake me, please.” Yuuri says, managing to keep his heartbeat steady, reaching down to pick up Vicchan. “See you tomorrow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He exhales in relief at the end and he definitely rehearsed his apology. Yuuri is not very reliable with descriptions of just how big of a crush Viktor has. I feel like sometimes he’s unintentionally cold with other people- internally he’s a huge ball of emotions, but outside he seems kind of collected. 
> 
> He also uses wandless magic, which is super difficult for any witch and wizard to master, but he doesn’t think much of it. No Phichit in this, though we meet the “spirited” Yurio for the first time. Managed to squeeze Chris in as well.
> 
> I made most of the Beauxbatons stuff up, since JKR doesn’t do much to describe it on Pottermore. _Non-magique_ is the official French name for muggles- which is way more boring compared with _moldu_. I envision Cate Blanchett as Madame Juliette Moreau (inspiration from Juliette Binoche and one of the most common French surnames) After this, it’s a time-skip to the opening ceremony and the first few months of teaching. Expect an update within six months to a year. 
> 
> Thanks for reading and leaving kudos. Please leave a comment if you want to see anything in this story happen I guess, I’m always looking for inspiration.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> himaho: literally 'non-magic', just a term I translated on google  
> Yuuri's animagus form is a red fox.
> 
> Ages:  
> Yuuri Katsuki: 22  
> Viktor Nikiforov:27


End file.
